The NBA Wants You to Kiss Its Ass

Those homewrecking charlatans. Those self-indulgent jerks. Those bastard sons of bitches.

We were in a relationship once, you know. For 41 years. Happily married. We entrusted them with our hearts and our souls. And then one day they ripped them to shreds.

But they didn’t just stop there.

The divorce was bitter. They took everything and left us with nothing but memories. They had all they needed, but still wouldn’t quit. They spun a dirty narrative: that we weren’t any good to them, that we didn’t do enough to keep them around, that it was our fault, that we were the bad guys.

What had we done besides faithfully devote ourselves to them? We showed up en masse, filled an arena to its gills, lived and died through the good seasons and the bad. They weren’t satisfied with leaving, though. They needed the rest of the world to scorn us, too.

Despite all of this, we’ve tried to make amends over the years. We’ve worked tirelessly to repair what any rational eye would see as irreparable. We’ve been through hell and we keep going back. But for what? A team? An assurance? Hope? It’s been ten years – a fucking decade – and all we’ve been fed is hollow rhetoric.

And now they come to us after all this time and offer a crumb. We’re hungry, starving even. And they give us a single preseason game. Like tossing a lone French fry to a bum on a corner. What the hell do you want us to do with this? You want us to be grateful? You want a thank-you? You want an ass-kissing?

Fuck the NBA.

If this is a peace offering, it blows. You don’t atone for an acrimonious separation with a pat on the head and a “let’s be friends.” Nah, it doesn’t work like that, you don’t get off that easy.

If this is a tryout, of sorts, go fist yourselves. This little parade might work in cities like Las Vegas or Vancouver. But you know what you have here. We bleed green and gold. We are the Supersonics. Don’t act like you forgot. You knew all along.

Look, I get it. I get that it’s exciting to picture a team like the Golden State Warriors traipsing into Key Arena and putting on a show. And just the thought of NBA basketball back in Seattle sends a brief murmur through my cold, dead heart.

But come on. This is a traveling circus that has rolled into numerous towns over the years, complete with empty promises and an outside chance at A Team to Call Your Very Own! And like a carnival barker trying his damnedest to draw in every unsuspecting sucker from miles around, the hype surrounding these exhibitions has inflated each of these miserably brief trial runs to far more than they actually are.

The reality is this: Whether one meaningless game sells out or doesn’t, the NBA will only return to Seattle when a shiny new arena stands proudly within the city limits. This scrap, this morsel, this appetizer means nothing.

The NBA wants us to believe. We’re the side piece holding out hope that our cheater of a man will finally leave his wife and run away with us. They want us on the hook, responding to their every beck and call.

But fuck that.

Whether the NBA comes or goes has no bearing on a piddling gesture. They just want your attention, your lust.

Don’t fool yourself into thinking this whimsical display disguised as an olive branch is something more than it is, because it isn’t. Go to the game and cheer your ass off if you want. Stay home and give zero shits if you prefer. But never forget that the NBA absolutely screwed every single one of us a decade ago. And they won’t hesitate to keep doing it for as long as they can.

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6 thoughts on “The NBA Wants You to Kiss Its Ass”

Nice article … we Seattle folk are more likely to flick a fry to a seagull…and hand a bag of Dick’s fries to the downtrodden … by the way can you start a movement to have Howard Shultz’s gilded shoe prints ripped out of the sidewalk outside Nordstrom’s? Fuck Shultz … he flicked the Green & Gold like a French fry to fat hungry seagull from OKC.

Thanks. This is pretty much my thoughts. I watch NBA fairly regularly on TV cause I like the game and the players, I will not attend a PRESEASON basketball game in my city just to appease the NBA or “show interest”. Sonics or Bust. F them.

Don’t forget that when they wanted the arena for the Sonics, the area was marred in a deep recession, we had just spent millions on two new stadiums and their was a demand for more school funding. The area economy was in the pits.